Enterprise app market is considered as one of the most potential trend for mobile developers in 2016. IDC predicted that 35% of big enterprises would utilize mobile application development platforms for building and deploying mobile apps.

Daniel Burrus – Burrus Research Company – conducted a survey with over 700 companies, 100 % of them agreed that half of the businesses in their industry would have their own mobile apps for various business’s functions within the next 2 years.

The surging need for an internal business mobile app is undeniable. It would be a loss if your business stays out of this trend. But what is so magical about Business Mobile App that everyone wants it so much? This article will reveal the reason why and give out some examples of how businesses currently leverage mobile app in their daily operations.

Mobile app helps boost company performance tremendously

In this era, one of the most important thing to help businesses survive is to act quickly and effectively. Employees must handle the job accurately and in a timely manner. Being fast and effective in the business not only helps companies capture trends and act sooner than their competitors, but also helps companies reduce costs and become more flexible in various situations. That is the reason why machines and information technology come in to help.

IT Applications in business can be found everywhere, but mostly on computers. However, everything is different now. Since the introduction of the smartphone, it has become a new potential management tool. Almost everyone in the world owns a smartphone. Smartphone is like a computer in your bare hand. You can talk to partners, send, email, surf the news, the Internet and do many other things with it. The best part is you can do it anywhere you want (because smartphones are small and easy to carry around, unlike computers). With all of those advantages, why don’t we create a business intelligence app right in those handheld devices? There is an increasing need for developing internal mobile apps of many companies. More and more of company’s staffs are working through their smartphones thanks to their convenience and timely manner. For example, with an internal email app on each employee’s phone, mail can easily be checked so that problems can be addressed accordingly.

Leveraging mobile for improving internal operations

One of the most significant cases of how mobile app can transform business is Unilever. Unilever, a top dynamic FMCG corporation in the world, soon recognized the potential of applying mobile app on the internal work. In March 2004, Unilever’s senior management requested their thousand top executives to be equipped with smartphone devices to boost their productivity.

The company chose BlackBerry 7100, 7290, and 8700 as they were leaders in the mobile category at that time and worked with heterogeneous e-mail servers and multiple wireless network standards, as well as CDMA and Wi-Fi.

These hand-held devices, with apps exclusively designed for Management of Unilever performance, allowed the executives to work on the move, and monitor the company’s performance such as sales figures. They were able to check emails anywhere they were and conveniently replied to them on time. This handset also allowed the executives to communicate more with their customers. As a result, Unilever increased its productivity and performance.

Another the case is of London Heathrow – the busiest international airport in Europe, whose app is capable of connecting more than 1700 employees at different corners of Heathrow. Before the launch of Heathrow Operations App, the communication among staff across 4.687 m² was always interrupted due to massive distance barrier.

After the whole enterprise shifted into a social, mobile, real time and two-way communication, employees can easily get updates and exchange information quickly from one to another terminal, minute to minute via their own internal social community. Whenever there is a new restaurant, shop or there is any important announcement, that information is at hands.

Moreover, the app also encourages staff to submit their ideas for operation improvements conveniently, which erased the whole complicated and time-consuming document and paper process in the past. Apart from enhancing communication, the app also has a strong analytics capability to prioritize and highlight important as well as popular news. All operations information are real-time update and at hands.

Another the case is of London Heathrow – the busiest international airport in Europe, whose app is capable of connecting more than 1700 employees at different corners of Heathrow. Before the launch of Heathrow Operations App, the communication among staff across 4.687 m² was always interrupted due to massive distance barrier. After the whole enterprise shifted into a social, mobile, real time and two-way communication, employees can easily get updates and exchange information quickly from one to another terminal, minute to minute via their own internal social community.

Whenever there is a new restaurant, shop or there is any important announcement, that information is at hands. Moreover, the app also encourages staff to submit their ideas for operation improvements conveniently, which erased the whole complicated and time-consuming document and paper process in the past. Apart from enhancing communication, the app also has a strong analytics capability to prioritize and highlight important as well as popular news. All operations information are real-time update and at hands.

Increasing engagement with customers via mobile apps

Moreover, mobile apps can help enhance customer’s interactions with a brand. Starbuck, the top dominator of the mobile commerce soon digitalized their communication with customers via mobile application. Aiming at giving their customer more time to enjoy morning coffee and make the order and payment process easier, they build a mobile app. So far, Starbucks has succeeded to transform the way their customers order and pay for coffee cups.

The app also allows their customer to buy giftcard, redeem offers and even tip the barista. Talking about the success, Schultz, Starbuck CEO shared that more than 20% of in-store sales comes from mobile transactions. Everyweek, there are more than 9 million purchasing activities via the app around the world, which clearly indicates how much their customers love the innovative application.

Amplify Entertainment, a wedding DJ company located in Florida, has a fascinating solution to solve the requests of wedding guests: they don’t have to shout out their requests to the DJ anymore. What often happens in a bar is that DJ cannot hear their customer requests due to extra loud music. Fortunately, Amplify Entertainment came up with a mobile application, which facilitated the song requesting process right from the guests’ table or dance floor. It was obvious that mobile applications can be applied in diverse, multi-dimensional functions in business and brings practical benefits. However, without a strong development force in-house, it’s necessary to ask for advice of your internal IT experts first, then get in touch with a trustworthy mobile app outsourcing service provider who has deep experiences in mobile app development company. If you plan to develop apps for both Android and iPhone users, then your mobile app service provider should have experience in both Android and iOS app development (multi-platform). Someone who is just experienced with only one platform shouldn’t be chosen.

Savvycom is an IT outsourcing company, that offers full service of web, cloud & mobile application development and also smart IT solutions for all types of clients: from start-ups to leading brands. Till now, we have successfully delivered over 200 premium mobile apps, 80 web apps in many different platforms for a diverse range of clients across assorted industry sectors.We work hard and intensively to bring success to our clients and make Savvycom a destination where IT means Intelligence and Trust.